


Stage Light

by Beth Harker (chiana606), chiana606



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Gen, gen - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 17:38:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9000289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chiana606/pseuds/Beth%20Harker, https://archiveofourown.org/users/chiana606/pseuds/chiana606
Summary: Spot tries to make sense of things after the rally.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Dani](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dani/gifts).



> Notes: Written as a Yuletide treat for Dani, who wanted to see a more developed characterization of the stage versions of Spot and Racetrack. Since most of the stage newsies have significant differences from their movie counterparts, I tried to resist the urge to just fill in the stage 'verse characterization gaps with stuff from the film. I was envisioning the original touring cast for most of the characters mentioned in this fic.

\------

The lights of the theatre died down long before the shouts of the boys squeezed inside it did. They'd come in excited and ready, wanting to take on the entire city, each and every borough, for the chance to finally be able to eke a scrap of fairness out of it. If Spot didn't say something soon, the dam of Brooklyn's anger and Brooklyn's passion was going to burst, and spill out directionless, now that Kelly had thrown away the common cause that had united them all here. A few of Spot's boys had already come up to stand in formation behind him, but a lot of them had scattered, looking for Jack or _anybody_ else they could fight. Spot didn't stop them. The key to leading was to do so with an iron fist, and only when necessary. Every display of power was crucial, but displays of authority were dangerous; every last one of them gave someone the opportunity to challenge you, and on the off chance that they won, then it was all over. Better to wait to take control until the situation really called for it, or until your inclinations matched those of the masses. 

"How'd you think these guys would like it if I told 'em to tear Kelly from limb to limb, and bring me his lying ass for a trophy?" Spot asked Smalls, who was one of those loyal ones, who had come to flank him right away. 

He was answered quickly by Southy, a kid who was Brooklyn through and through. "I'll take first punch, if you says we can." Southy was small and bird like, _valuable_ , better suited for flitting from place to place collecting secrets than he was fighting. Spot looked him up and down. 

"I ain't gonna say you can't," he answered at last. "Any of you's who wants to take a bite out of Kelly has my blessing. Me? I'm gonna get to the bottom of this." 

Possibly somebody already was taking a bite out of Jack, or knocking his brains out. Spot had never known that kid to run off like that, with his tail between his legs, but maybe that was because the last few years of his life had been occupied doing more important things than discovering whether or not Jack Kelly was a skunk and a coward. Maybe it was a good thing that Spot had finally gotten around to it. 

Spot cast around for somebody to talk to, or more specifically for the - _right_ person. Davey had a small crowd around him, and was trying to stammer his way through reasons that the strike wasn't over. It made Spot sick to his stomach. It wasn't that Davey was dumb, just that his kind of smart was the wrong kind. Half the kids who seemed to be listening to his word were liable to aim a punch at him any second, if he didn't say something good fast, or learn how to control his voice so he could be loud without seeming to be screaming. Davey's kid brother might be a better leader, all things considered.

Then, off in the corner, Spot noticed a pair of Manhattan boys, one small and in a striped shirt, and the other one curly haired and young, puffing away at cigar that wasn't even lit. Something about the cigar reminded Spot of a dog with a chew toy, and if there hadn't been a certain wry turn to the boy's mouth, he would have let him be. As things were, he fumbled in his pocket for a match, then strode over to the boys, leaning against the wall where they stood. He lit a match, and handed it to the boy with the cigar in his mouth. The boy hesitated. 

"You Manhattan boys know what that thing in your mouth is for, or what?" Spot asked. The boy's eyes, which were too big to start with, got a little bigger when he saw who he was talking to. He put his cigar in his pocket, so Spot shrugged, blew the match out, and let it drop between them. 

"I'm savin' it," the boy said, and then he got that expression again, the one that said he knew plenty. "No use in squatering a corona, I always says." 

"Squatering?" the boy in the striped shirt repeated. 

"Yeah," answered the other boy. "Like wasting something you could use later. Squatering." 

"You mean like Jacky boy did with his chances of anyone whose anyone ever listening to his sorry mouth again?" Spot asked. 

"Now that's just mean," said the boy in the striped shirt. 

"Might be true," said the cigar boy, but he didn't look happy about it. "I'm Racetrack, by the way, and this here's Romeo." 

"We knows who you is," Romeo piped up. 

"And I don't care who you's is," Spot said, even as he filed the names away in his mind for later use. Come to think of it, he was pretty sure he'd seen this Racetrack lurking around Sheepshead, and he'd have to deal with that one of these days, but for now he had more important fish to fry. "We ain't one city, Brooklyn and Manhattan," said Spot. "The two of you ain't my concern." 

"According to the papes we have been since 1888," said Racetrack. "Doesn't mean you gotta like it, but we is." 

"According to the papes this night never happened," Spot countered. "But both you and me knows better." Here, Spot moved in a little closer, and dropped his voice. "What do you think got into Jack?" he asked. 

"It ain't like him," said Romeo. 

"Maybe it is," was Racetrack's bitter reply. "You think you know a guy..." 

"Back a few years ago," said Romeo, "When I was locked up in the a Refuge, he was always showin' up at the window with food and clothes and stuff, was Jack. This ain't like him. It had to have been something with Crutchie. Somebody must've threatened Crufchie, or else..." Romeo frowned and gestured to the stage, which looked rather forlorn without all of its lights lit up. 

"It could've been Santa Fe," said Racetrack, but something in Romeo's face made him think better of it. "It was probably Crutchie." 

"It's a damn disaster, is what it is," said Spot. And it was. Jack was either soft (in both his heart and his head), or else he was rotten to the core. Either way, he was a dirty scab, and Spot was going to give him a good soaking when this was all over. How good of one depended on whether this strike was salvageable or not. Spot had risked his neck and his reputation to come out here and join it, after all.


End file.
